El Dia de Quatro

Today was our first day of classes. We met el Plaza Mayor and then went to the University. I wasn't sure how the classes were going to work of if they would be like Spanish classes at Ursuline or not. They were way more fun!! I actually had a really great time and the teachers were very talkative and friendly and asked us all to introduce ourselves. Although they were all enjoyable, they each had very distinct teaching styles. The first teacher gave us a lot of worksheets which were good refreshers about grammar. The second, the conversation class, we talked the whole time about ourselves and about what is different here than in America. After our second class, our teacher said "estaís libras" which means you are free, and some girls thought that meant we were done with all our classes for the day, so they left and we had to literally chase after them, but we caught them before they were too far away. The third was about culture and it was amazing to learn all the history and about the different communities-- the equivalent of our states-- and the geography of Spain. Also, during our break, we discovered a coffee machine in the university where all coffee is 0,50€ and it has delicious coffee!!! I really enjoyed having a set agenda for the morning and I can't wait for the rest of our days of classes!! 

After classes, we came home and had lunch with our host families. My family served us pasta and t was very good!! Then we took a quick nap and then went shopping! After that, we met in the plaza for a tour of the city. First, we went around to some very famous places like various churches, the library and then toured the old Universidad de Salamanca. It was very interesting to see all of the old classrooms and learn about their traditions. One really interesting tradition, is if a student passed a test for his doctorate, they hosted a grand celebration and slaughtered a cow and used its blood to write something on the walls of the school. Many people wrote victor like the photo shown where all the letters are connected and you can actually read them. This tradition stopped in the 18th century, but many of these are still visible on the stone both inside and outside the school. We got to tour the "new" cathedral which is actually 800 years old. It was very pretty when we went on the roof and we could see almost the whole city. Overall today was a very fun and busy day and we are all very tired and excited for the rest of the week!! Adios!! Nos vemos!